


not my homeland anymore

by firstlovelatespring



Category: The Night Circus - Erin Morgenstern
Genre: Gen, Post-Canon, ToT: Battle of the Bands
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-12
Updated: 2020-10-12
Packaged: 2021-03-07 22:29:32
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,259
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26961430
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/firstlovelatespring/pseuds/firstlovelatespring
Summary: It was possible to delight in magic without knowing where it came from.Rêveursdid exactly this in the last hours between nightfall and dawn, beacons of red among all the black and white: they believed.
Comments: 8
Kudos: 13
Collections: Trick or Treat Exchange 2020





	not my homeland anymore

**Author's Note:**

  * For [kingstoken](https://archiveofourown.org/users/kingstoken/gifts).



It was easy to fall in love with Marco because he was magic. He was every shiny object, myth, and legend, all wrapped up in a pretty face and a black bowler hat. He told her once, back when she was in love, that magic did not work unless you believed in it. But those days spent braiding ribbons in an armchair in his flat faded together in Isobel’s memory. Maybe he hadn’t said that, maybe it had been that belief in magic was the very thing that made it work. The distinction didn’t matter then; belief and magic were right there together as she held the ribbons in her fingers, willing them into place. There _was_ a difference, Isobel learned too late. But before she learned this, Isobel believed in Marco, and thought that belief was enough.

For a year after leaving the Circus, Isobel did not read. She took a train to Barcelona, and then Munich, and Prague, learning to make drinks and speak bits of Spanish, German, and Czech. Isobel grew accustomed to coaxing out the approximate details of the lives of strangers across a bar instead of a small table, glasses between them instead of cards. Faces could be read just as easily, if you knew how to look.

For that year, Isobel did not touch her Marseilles deck, avoiding it at first like the cursed object the woman who gave it to her had insisted it was. The deck sat at the bottom of a suitcase never to be fully unpacked, and it traveled along with her between cities, even as she forgot scarves and handkerchiefs in between. Isobel could not seem to leave her Marseilles deck behind. At first she kept it out of resentment. Or at least, she thought she ought to feel that way. But no matter how hard she tried, it was impossible to resent the Circus, or even to resent Celia. Instead the presence of the Marseilles deck in the bottom of her suitcase and the back of her mind grew comfortable, familiar.

Isobel gave up trying to leave the deck behind. 

Memories of the Circus in that first year made Isobel feel, more than anything else, stupid. It had been her profession to know the future; how had it taken her so long to understand even the present? In retrospect, of course, what Isobel could not see became clear. It was not unlike how Celia passed off real magic as clever illusion to circus goers night after night. Hidden in plain sight, trusting that the audience would not know to look. Even when it no longer hurt to think of her cards, how could Isobel go on reading when she had missed Marco’s feelings for Celia for so long?

It was the end of October when Isobel heard the Circus had arrived in Prague. She was working behind the bar at a small café and renting a room upstairs from the owners. Isobel had been there for several months, longer than she had stayed in any other place since leaving the Circus. After years traveling every few days by train, it was odd to be in one place again for so long. Odd, but not unpleasant.

It seemed as though the city had grown tired of fall ahead of schedule: gusts of wind rattled the windows of the café, and a wintry chill crept in beneath the door. In the evening sleet began to fall, and what had been murmurs of interest among the café’s patrons at the Circus’s arrival turned to grumbles about the bad weather and hopes that the Circus would stay another day until skies cleared.

Isobel did not notice the lack of _rêveurs_ among her customers until a man in a long coat entered the café. He inadvertently made quite an entrance; wind gusted in behind him and the door slammed open before he could catch it. He was tall and dark-haired, like Marco, but he was effortlessly handsome, not polished or carefully coiffed. The man shook out his umbrella and hung up his coat, revealing a deep red scarf underneath. He met Isobel’s eyes and smiled, and she looked away.

Her Czech was coming along, but it was a pleasant surprise to hear the man order a drink in slow, English-accented Czech. She answered in English, and wondered if he had traveled all this way to see the Circus, although she didn’t ask. She had heard that some rêveurs did this, but never met one. It was uncommon anyway for travelers to come to the café; it was tucked along a side street, far from the city’s center. But this rêveur had come, and was engaging her in small talk over the bar, and did not take off his scarf.

It was strange to see him; there was no question about that. Isobel tried at first to muster resentment, but like with her cards, it would not come. Isobel could not resent this man, who had traveled all this way to see the Circus he loved despite not knowing its inner workings. Who perhaps loved the Circus because he could not. Isobel knew, too, what it was like to fall in love with magic.

The man finished his drink, and without being asked to, Isobel poured him a mug of hot cider. “The Circus must have a secret ingredient,” she said, placing the drink in front of him. “I have never been able to make my cider taste as good.”

The man smiled, fingering his red scarf. “Nice to meet another _rêveur_ ,” he replied, and Isobel did not correct him.

It was possible to delight in magic without knowing where it came from. _Rêveurs_ did exactly this in the last hours between nightfall and dawn, beacons of red among all the black and white: they believed. And then, most wondrously of all, the magic stayed with them when they stumbled, exhausted, home to sleep. It had been months since the man at the café had been to the Circus, Isobel learned that night over several mugs of cider, but the magic still danced in his eyes. It didn’t matter that it was born at the Circus, only that it was born at all. Now it was clearly a part of him, for as long as he believed in it.

Isobel closed early that night, and took the stairs up to her room two at a time. She knew exactly where she’d find her Marseilles deck, although it had been a year since she’d last held it. Hunched over a low table, Isobel cut the deck by candlelight, still wearing her shoes. Now that the thought of reading had entered her mind again, it was impossible to resist.

Magic had not seemed like something Isobel could do after leaving the Circus. She had only ever believed in it with Marco; was it even possible to read after such a long time away? Isobel paused, fingers outstretched over the piles of cards.

With the man in the café, it had seemed so easy. He had left an address, and invited her to come to the Circus with him the following night. She would not go with him, but she would write. Being around him had made her feel magic again. Or maybe it had reminded her of the magic that still lived within her.

Isobel turned a card over. _La Roue de Fortune_ stared up at her, and she smiled.

Magic would not desert her again because it never had. Isobel had only lost belief.


End file.
